uh...we're not from around here

The Bloody Mary

2009-04-02T19:45:00.004+11:00

It has taken me a year. Re-entry to stardard life was traumatic. I usually go through a "depressed" period whenever I return home from anywhere, but the dark period after I returned home from my amazing trip with ole Bry was extreme. It has basically taken a year for me to feel content living in chicago, and there have been times when I was sure I would move, and change my life drastically, but as it happens, i'm still there............ Well....not there in the LITERAL sense right now. Let me explain. Eleven months ago, Bryan was ready for me to finish up online and head out. He had every right to be. I had been taking my sweet time in an internet cafe in Saigon and Hill and Bryan were very ready to leave. I eventually left and we had the good fortune to just happen upon the Olympic Torch (I always for some reason want to call it the Olympic flag. But no, it's a torch.) Coming down Le Loi, right through the middle of HCMC. The faithful blog reader that you are (By the way, I echo Bryan's thanks and amazement that so many of you chose to waste your time reading our ramblings. Thanks a lot!), you will probably be thinking: "Yes yes, I remember this part: went to Nha Trang that night, Bad bus tix, worse mexican restaurant, pool with a frenchman, Reunificiation day. Don't waste my damn time". That little walk down memory lane was necessary to paint the picture for you of where I am sitting right now. I am absolutely certain that I am in the same internet cafe, typing this, and reasonably certain I am at the same computer (#10 : ole slowy! "go ole slowy GO!"). The internet cafe is exactly the same. The scores of loud male adolescents plugged into W.O.W., and me typing amoungst them, are the same. Much like the rest of HCMC. Exactly as amazing and overwhelming as I rememeber. I heard Hill and glen were up and moving back to OZ so I figured I had to squeeze in one more visit before they repatriated.

I guess this is kind of like drinking a bloody mary the night after getting wasted. The theory is that the alcohol in the drink kind of eases your transition back to normalcy, averting the dreaded cold turkey effect that causes a serious hangover. It's not a theory I tend to subscribe to as far as booze is concerned, but I'll take any excuse to go back to 'nam. It has been amazing to be back and chill in all the old haunts. It has certainly dredged up a whole ton of memories that I had forgotten. I have been thinking about the trip a lot while I have been here, and I am feel that the bloody mary has worked! I am actually OK with going back to Chicago tomorrow. This short trip has been wonderful, and going into it with the mindset that it is just a short trip to see family that just happen to live in one of the most badass cities ever has made it emotionally managable. I walked through the backpackers quarter earleir today and it got me to thinking. I am not sure I could ever do another trip that hinges so importantly on major backpacker destinations like Cambodia and Thailand. The whole culture is hilarious and absurd and so uniform that I have little interest in partying on Khao San any more. (Ok thats a lie) And the ubiquitous Vang Vieng tubing drunken exravaganza, the highlight of any fat, pale, obnoxious english person's life thus far, in Laos, no longer holds the same intrigue. (Also a lie) Before the trip I had a great love of people from the UK, now I have pretty much had enough of them. (Simply, A lie). This trip made me more mature and focused and decided (Lies! All lies!). I came back to Chicago ready to get a job and cut my hair (Horrible, remorseless LIES!). Ok. I can't wait to go again. People keep saying things to the effect of: "you've probably got it out of your system after that, right?". The truth is that no, I haven't and I don't think I ever will so love me or leave me ( please don't leave me.....i'm cold). Looking back on the trip, I feel it was amazing and wonderful, and easily the best thing I have ever done, ever, but I can also see how "inside the box" it was in many ways. before I went, I had all of these stories crammed into my head about how "nine aussies were framed in Indonesia and some evil drug dealer crammed their bags full of heroin and now they're DEAD and thats going to happen to you if you're not careful". I was defintiley a little bit nervous leaving Melbourne, but in retrospect that was just my own ignorance and lack of trust towards people I wasn't familiar with. That is perhaps the most important legacy of the trip as far as I am concerned. I have a much better understanding of the fact that it is always PEOPLE that live in these countries, all looking for pretty much the same thing you are. There is absolutely no reason to fear the people of a whole country. They are not evil, they are probably a whole lot more friendly and helpful than the people in countries where this blog is being read. Looking back, the times I remember the most fondly and that I feel were the most important to me as a person, were the times that I feel we were truely out there. For instance, the time we were on the train to Wudangshan, and everyone was coming up and looking at us, and according to this guy named Kevin, we were the first western people these poeple on the train had ever seen in the flesh. Now that's a feeling! Felt like fucking Maggelan or something (to be said in the voice of the wonderful and talented CB walker, whose quote brought me to tears when Bryan used it to end his last post. so right on).

Things like that, and meeting some truely ridiculous and wonderful people. a quick honor roll: To all the people that made the trip worth taking: Sydney Crew, Melbs Crew, Ben and Kim, Kyomi, Staff of smile, that guy Mark with the Thai hooker who went on the "trek", former english drug dealer who lives on Khao San rd, "bartenders" in Chiang Mai, Tina and Olaf, Tessie and the Gozzling, That drunk guy in BK on Songkrahn, Basically the entire population of Cambodia, Sara and Stella, Indian couple from KL in Sihanoukville, Hill and Glen, Sara and Rishi, Darren, Annoying german girl whose name I forgot, Dudes on the beach in Nha Trang, Qiaoru, French owner of shitty mexican restaurant in Nha Trang, Basically entire population of Vietnam, Bec, Tang (dude that looked like Jamiel in Hanoi), Si, rest of retarded english people from Halong bay trip, BJUVMAN, guy in Guilin that tried to help us by calling his sister in Guangzhou, that guy's sister in Guangzhou, Ozzie judge in HK that helped us find the peak tram, Cj, Tigerlily, Staff of Snurrbart bar in HK, kevin, little girl that simply would not chill out on train to Wudanshan, guy that paid for me when I was confused on train to Wudangshan, family that helped us in Wudangshan town, "I am a gay" dude on Wudangshan, "Fellow Americans" badass dude on Wudangshan, two girls on Wudangshan, Bus full of old people that let us hitchhike for free, girls in Shiyan, Blue bridge: you crazy son of a bitch what was your angle?, Han, Helen and Andy, Old chinese guy that knew about evanston, Andrew on Su Zho Hou, everyone on Su Zho Hou, Mio, Rob, Schang, the wonderful Sugimoto family, Love Express, Kaz, Mr. K, Bands that Performed at Marz, everyone else at Marz, Owner of bar that just served Johnny Black and finally I have to thank the man himself, who stuck by me through the whole thing, the one person I don't think would have left me for dead anywhere and the best person in the world to travel with: Bryan. Thank you to everyone.

It is getting late and there are still a few sips left at the bottom of my Bloody mary. tonight I will hit the streets of HCMC on a moto, something I would never trust myself to do. But then again........I've got a tour guide. (Cue "that" look) I have never been one for goodbyes. If I ever go anywhere again and something funny happens, you'll be the first to know.

cheersmate
Kap khun Kap
Cambodian one
Gum Ern Yue
Xie Xie
Duomo Arigato
Thanks
Patrick

6 weeks on...

2008-08-06T06:49:00.010+10:00

so i suppose i have put this off as long as i can. it seems its time for the final update...

i guess i've been intentionally avoiding a final blog post ever since i got back, telling myself that if there is still one last update to be made, if there is still some news to tell, then our asian excursion isn't so far from being over after all. that if we leave the ending open, leave the readers wanting more, then maybe we're not really back just yet. maybe we're still adjusting, still unpacking. (i guess we'll just have to make a sequel...do i see patrick and bryan's crazy south asian, nepalese, western china adventure 2009 in the pipeline?). but the fact is, its already early august 'round these parts, and i guess 'round yer parts too, which means that somehow we've been back home for about 6 weeks. this is absolutely shocking to me.

in a way, i've gotten so comfortably settled back in to a normal existence (of course, how can i define a 'normal' existence anymore. frankly, i sometimes feel like the way the world works back home here is so ass-backwards from normal that it just comes off as fake. i feel like i'm on the set of 'the truman show' or something), and so used to the way things work here, its as if the trip never even happened. i can look at the pictures and see my face in them, and i can remember that first day walking through bangkok, or our moto rides along the southern edge of vietnam with 4 strangers that i don't think i'll ever forget, or a sleepless train ride into the heart of rural china, but it doesn't feel like me. and it doesn't feel like i was there. its as if i was photo-shopped into those pictures, and that all those memories were planted in my head. the trip doesn't seem real.

in another way however, i feel like i just got off the plane yesterday. people come up to me asking 'how did the trip go?', or 'how long have you been back?' and i have to remind myself to tell them that i've been back for 6 weeks already. and i don't know how that's possible. i can vividly remember that first day wandering aimlessly around sydney, trekking across the harbor bridge as dusk fell, or the following day getting stuck in a pub in 'the rocks' waiting for the rain to let up (it never did). and i vividly remember running into a shop in melbourne to buy a long sleeved shirt on the way to the mcg for my first afl match, and i remember the papaya salads on koh tao, and bar street in siem reap, the smell of our snake meal in hanoi, and that day we had to spend killing time in shiyan. i remember scrambling to get tickets booked to shanghai from beijing, my first taste of real ramen in fukuoka, wandering around kyoto waiting for jonathan and rob to show up, and the sunset from mt. hakodate. i remember it all so well that i feel like i must have just gotten off the plane yesterday. i don't see how i've been back for 6 weeks! i haven't even done anything!!

but according to the calendar, and everyone else that assures me it is in fact august 6th, we have apparently been back for 6 weeks. have i told you how shocking i find this? just kidding.

so what can i say about our trip, other than i feel like i never went and that i just got back, simultaneously. well, for starters i can say that i would go back to any of the places we were, at the drop of a hat, which surprises me. you see, before getting back to chicago, i figured this would have quenched the traveling bug for awhile. i felt like a person ready to settle in and calmly figure out what to do next, in the comfort of sweet home chicago. but if someone handed me a ticket for ho chi minh for tomorrow, i'd be on that plane so fast that...well, i don't know what...but i'd be on that plane really, really fast. so apparently, i'm not at all ready to settle in, and i'm pretty much planning another trip out in my head already. yet at the same time, i feel like the trip has really focused me. before we left, i didn't quite know what i wanted to do once i got back. i didn't know whether i should stay in music, whether i should just quit and find a 9 to 5, or do something else entirely, i had no plan at all. and now that i'm back, i'm more than ready to stick it out in music, figure out exactly how to make it work, and do it. i suppose the trip reaffirmed the idea that you can take a risk, jump head on into uncharted waters, and come out still breathing.

and there are other aspects of my life that have been affected by this trip too, but i can't think of them off the top of my head right now, and even if i could, i doubt you would want to hear about them. i'm talking about the smaller parts of life, the mundane things; like i said, the things you probably wouldn't want to hear about.

so how do i even wrap this up with a nice little bow. i guess, simply, i'm happy to be back, happy to see friends and family, happy to tell stories and show pictures to anyone willing to listen, and ready to get focused on the next chapter of life. but i'd be kidding myself if i said i wouldn't do it all over again. if someone came up to me with a plane ticket for sydney, and told me i could go back there, and do it all again, from start to finish, without changing a thing, i'd be gone in a heartbeat.

peace,
bryan

p.s. so there it is ladies and gentleman, the final update. i have no idea who is still reading this, but if you are someone who is, thanks for sticking it out with us. it was an absolute blast keeping this blog, both for everyone back home trying to keep up with us and for ourselves as a memento to look back on. it was always fun writing a funny story, or posting a disgusting video, trying to imagine the responses of certain readers back home, but all the while not really knowing for sure who was ever reading this thing. there were times when we felt that we'd better get a post up soon to keep the throngs of loyal readers happy, and there were more times where we felt like we were the only one's reading it anyway. but now that we're back, i can't count how many people have said to us, 'hey, how was the trip? we loved reading the blog?' so i guess it was a hit! so thanks for being such a good audience, and like i said in the very beginning, i hope it was at least somewhat interesting, a little informative, and always funny. and hopefully in the not too distant future, there will be a reason to start it up again. and who knows, maybe i'll put something up every once in awhile...just for kicks.

tokyo: the epilogue

2008-06-24T07:53:00.006+10:00

and so we have come to the end. the final showdown, the last hoorah, the closing credits, the epilogue. and what better place to draw this ridiculous asia trip to a close than the massive, space-age, megatropolis that is tokyo?

after saying goodbye to the small, quaint, relaxed, quiet town of hakodate, we hopped on the shinkansen and headed for the capital, ready to go out with a bang. we arrived in the late evening, and as was the norm by now, had put off booking a hostel until the last minute, of course leaving nothing available. so we put plan b into action, headed for the nearest capsule hotel, and checked in. now, if you are unfamiliar with a capsule hotel, they are exactly what they sound like: a room of tiny little sleeping capsules, stacked on top of one another, looking like a scene straight out of 'the fifth element.' after taking in the hilarity of our sleeping arrangements, a quick walk around the neighborhood, and a conveyor belt sushi dinner, we were beat, so we headed back to bed.

the next couple days were spent walking around the city's different districts (shibuya, shinjuku, ebisu, ginza, etc.), eating noodles and sushi, marveling at $150 mangos, and getting mentally prepared for home. on thursday morning, we woke up at 5:30 am to head to one of tokyo's major sights, the famous tsukiji fish market, the largest fish market in the world and the thing that essentially makes japan run. and it was incredible. almost any sea creature you could imagine, and many things you can't, is here. giant yellowfin tuna, red snapper, eels of all kinds, squid, octopus, clams, and tons of other fish, all being chopped up and sold to restaurants and sushi chefs. seeing it in person, its hard to believe there is anything still swimming in the oceans at all, if a market like this goes on every morning!! but this was not the time for conservation, and we treated ourselves to the the freshest sushi breakfast each of us had ever had. the rest of the day was spent very calmly, since we were all exhausted from the super-early morning. and that night, we at extremely well again since we were spending the night at patrick's girlfriend hana's, parent's place, who now live in tokyo. now super full and completely exhausted, we chilled with a few dry martinis care of hana's dad, and called it an early night.

our last day in tokyo was again spent walking around different neighborhoods, eating as much as we could handle, and reeling from the thought that it was our last 24 hours in asia. as night fast approached, we started searching for places that seemed appropriate for a last night. eager to get things rolling, we ducked into the first bar we could find, a small underground place for a few starter drinks, which quickly turned into several starter drinks and a rousing solo karaoke performance by patrick. after an hour or so, we left, headed straight for an arcade (which are very popular in japan) for a quick fix of mario kart. with our buzz fading, we left the arcade for another bar. again after a quick drink, we met up with a friend (hana's sister, mai), and headed for our next stop. after some aimless wandering, we stepped into yet another small bar for a quick drink. but by now, we were ready for a little more action, something a little more japanese, and intrigued by a group of japanese hard rockers mingling outside a club called 'marz,' we made our way over there, asked what was going on, and quickly went in. it was a small club, with a good stage set up with instruments, dark lights, a small balcony, and $5 beer (cheap by tokyo standards). we figured we had made a good choice, and when the mc came out in a head-to-toe deranged looking clown outfit, we knew for sure we were in the right place. at 1am, the first band went on, and they were awesome. at 2, the next band. at 3, the next band. all of them ridiculously awesome. there were 5 bands total, starting at 1 in the morning, and all of them kicked ass. we all agreed that it was one of the best shows any of us had been to, and it was the perfect end to this trip. when the last band was finally over, we stumbled out into the dawn-lit streets of tokyo, sweaty, drunk, ears ringing, voices hoarse, and minds blown, hopped into a cab and went home.

the next morning, or 2 hours later, whichever way you want to look at it, jonathan and rob woke up an hour and a half late, scrambled to pack their stuff, jumped in a cab, and booked it to the airport, narrowly missing their flight home. i stayed asleep. i finally woke up at noon, had a quick sushi breakfast, packed my things for the final time, and patrick and i headed for the train to the airport.

and there you have it ladies and gentleman. as quickly as it started, it ended, and now i sit here typing this from from the good ol' U.S. of A. but i know a better ending couldn't have been written, and tokyo really put on a show for us there at the end. the neon, the people, the food, the fish market, the rock show; it was the best way, and really the only way, to end this completely crazy, amazingly ridiculous adventure through asia, and for that, tokyo is amazing.

peace,
bryan

from kyushu to hokkaido

2008-06-18T15:05:00.005+10:00

so here it is, faithful readers, as promised: an update... [cue comic book music]

...we last left our caped crusaders in southern japan, dangling over a boiling pit of deadly onsen water. the evil mastermind beppu had them firm in his grasp. luckily captain...

anyway, after a most enjoyable 3 days relaxing in beppu, we decided it was time to move on. the next stop: hiroshima. we arrived midday, and feeling energetic, headed straight to the island of miyajima to check out the famous big red gate standing in the ocean. and much as i suspected, there was in fact, a big red gate standing in the ocean. not really sure why, but the japanese seem to like this sort of thing, so we went with it. after miyajima, we headed back to hiroshima, and cursed with an early curfew that night, took a simple walk around the neighborhood, ate dinner, and crashed. the next morning we were up at the crack of dawn, or close enough, and quickly set out to see the atomic bomb sights of the city, which can only be described as haunting. the city has rebuilt itself remarkably since 1945, but its hard not to get a sense of the tragedy that occured there. but with so much to see and so little time, we left hiroshima by noon and headed for himeji castle to bask in some happier history. and after basking a little too long, we realized that there was absolutely no chance of us making it to our next destination, nagano, that night, so we opted for a night in osaka.

and pretty much nothing happened. we checked in, ate dinner, went to sleep, woke up, and checked out. we'll miss you osaka. back on the shinkansen, we were flying, and not one to pass up opportunities to see castles, we stopped along the way to check out the black castle of matsumoto. not to spoil the ending for anyone, but it is as they say...black. with our appetite for historic castles wetted, we took off for nagano, and being the procrastinators that we are, were forced to check into a traditional japanese ryokan for the night. we're talking paper walls, tatami mats, sleeping on the floor, a creaky (but awesome) old building, motherly matron, the works. it was truly one of the most enjoyable places i've stayed in asia so far. the next morning we did some temple hopping, walked around a bit, and parted ways with patrick the romantic, who was on his way to tokyo for a surprise visit for his girlfriend. now, i have been traveling with that dude for the past 3 plus months, and spent just about every waking hour with him, so his absence was a little strange at first, but nothing a good happy hour couldn't fix. so we went and found a bar.

after 2 nights in nagano, we decided it was time to venture on up to the island of the north, hokkaido, for a little wilderness before our final stop in the urban jungle of tokyo. we had planned on staying in sapporo, but due to an unprecedented 50 minute train delay, we missed our next connection and were forced to crash for the night in a small town named hakodate. and we couldn't have been happier. hakodate was awesome; small, relaxed, a bit chillier, great seafood, lots of history...what's not to love. and so we never made it to sapporo, and instead spent the next 3 days in hakodate, just walking around, drinking coffee, eating crab, squid, scallops, abalone (accidently), etc. by the time it was ready to leave, patrick had rejoined the group, so we said goodbye to the town and headed to our last stop of this ridiculous asia tour, the megatropolis that can only be tokyo. and it is here that we spend our final 5 days, taking in our final sights and smells of asia...something tells me it won't disappoint.

bryan

"Kyoto-ns of fun" and "Beppu: Hot Stuff from the Center of The Earth".....oooooo

2008-06-08T20:17:00.007+10:00

After the 5 day nap that was our time in Fukuoka, Bryan and I felt reasonably excited about heading to Japan's tourist Mecca, Kyoto. We took our time getting up there and when we rolled in at 6:00 to find the place that we wanted to stay in (evidently not seriously enough to make reservations) was filled up, we had to do a bit of scrambling to find a bed, but with the worldwide electronic network it was no problem. We checked into a spotless, wonderfully cheap (for retardedly expensive Japan) hostel called K's house and spent an uneventful night hanging out. The next day we had some logistics to work out before a certain 7:30 Rendezvous. At about 7:13, Jonathan and Rob walked into our room and we had a couple of hilarious minutes of pleasantries before heading off to conveyor belt sushi. The next day we rented bicycles, and after a brief refresher course, set off around the city in search of temples. After seeing some old stuff and some pretty stuff we got back to the hostel, completely exhausted and smelling delicious. After showers and hanging out, we had plans to meet up with a friend for Okonomyaki (Japanese pancake/pizza-ish thing). After Karaoke, the four of us were in fine spirits and got into a bizarre noise making affair with a local Japanese guy that enjoyed yelling and jumping around. The next day was filled with a trip out to Japan's cultural heart, Nara. We spent an enjoyable, picturesque, rainy day viewing shrines and dodging deer before returning exhausted and starving to our neck of the woods. Jonathan was keen to "interact with the locals", so we went into a tiny bar at the end of the street where the only patrons were two 70 year old men, that didn't seem the least bit impressed with my bid to break the ice by doing a Karaoke version of "We Are The Champions." We left promptly after. The next day we were back on the fantastic Shinkansen, headed for the traditional hotspring bath capital of Japan, Beppu.

Beppu is chilled out. Our Hostel had an Onsen (Traditional Japanese Bath) on the grounds and the first thing we did was partake in this ages old ritual. After a brief fruitless search for an ATM, we went into a local restaurant for Sashimi, Katsudon, gyoza, yakisoba, and Basashi (raw horse meat). The beer flowed freely and we stumbled home and into the onsen, which is open 24 hours a day. The next day we were up at 7:00 because we had to climb a volcano named Asosan. The volcano was awesome and we climbed it. Then we ate some food and drank some beer. We couldn't really get up early again so we decided to spend another day in Beppu's hilariously hot Onsens, pretending not to look at the naked old Japanese men that were our sole companions. Extremely relaxed, we sit here now biding our time and wondering what tomorrow should hold.
Patrick

the warm up to the afterparty

2008-06-03T17:43:00.004+10:00

by the time we had arrived in osaka, japan, we were exhausted, unshaven, dirty, our wallets were empty, and i was now fighting a cold. we had five days to kill before our two buddies from back home, rob and jonathan, were due to meet us, and absolutely no idea what to do or where to go. so we didn't go anywhere. we grabbed the only two open seats in the entire osaka train station (this just happened to be a mcdonald's), drank some coffee, and contemplated our next move. after talking it through failed to get us any closer to a destination, we simply looked at the map, picked a place at random, and hopped on the next train we could. and so we have spent the past four days in the city of fukuoka (aka hakata) doing what we have needed to do for a long while. we've been taking it easy, doing our laundry, sleeping in, showering a ton, walking around the city with no real purpose, happily getting lost, eating, and seeing zero sights. it has been awesome. exactly what we needed after the whirlwind that was china.

and now we're in japan's cultural epicenter, kyoto, waiting anxiously for rob and jonathan's long overdue arrival, and the final chapter of this ridiculously awesome tour of asia to begin. in fact, they should be here any minute...

peace,
bryan

China, you Shanghai'd my heart

2008-05-31T03:06:00.004+10:00

The remainder of our time in China was spent running around Shanghai, desperately trying to get tickets to a boat and the exchange orders for our Japanese Rail passes. We had to get all of this done in one day, and due to poor organization and a couple of major annoyances beyond our control, it took all day to do it. After all of the buisness was put to rest, we decided on heading to the famed "French Concession" for a cup of coffee. We had a hard time finding the "French" under all of that conceding so we settled on a happy hour instead. It was a cheap happy hour, and before we knew it, we were at Mister Donut drinking coffee and eating......Mister Donut. The next morning we were up bright and early to get to the boat that would take us to Japan. What followed was a period of enforced relaxation on the good ship "Su Zho Hao." 44 karaoke and book filled hours later we were getting off the boat in Osaka with under $2 (US) worth of Chinese money in our pockets. It did not take us long to figure out that (like their Chinese counterparts) Japanese ATMs do not want any people taking any money out of them ever.

But First: China, In Remembrance

I had made my peace with China treating me like shit about 6 months before I got there. I expected restaurants to be closed to me and people going out of their way to pointlessly screw me over.　I was ready for it and I had already made excuses for it in my head. (When you've got 1.3 billion people in your country, you have no choice but to screw people) I was ready to see babies shitting all over public places and people spitting everywhere. I was practically fine with getting robbed. But from the very first person we met in China, there was none of what the media tells me Chinese people are like. OK, they do spit a lot and the babies go...when..... the babies have to go, but everyone was almost annoyingly kind. 5 different people devoted their entire days to taking us around for no reason at all. It was really Han, Kevin, Helen and Andy and the random girl that made China so special for us. The food is also great, but all of the best things we ate, and we ate some great things, were because they ordered them for us at restaurants we never would have had a hope of coming across. I will never think of food the same way again after realizing that at one point I had: a seahorse, 2 scorpions, a kidney, a silkworm, cow's stomach, a sheep's testicle and the best and spiciest thing I have ever eaten that involves eating an enormous fish and then progressively turning it into a delicious hot pot, all in my stomach at the same time. All of it was good. Besides the seahorse and the silk worm. They were crunchy and explosive, respectively. The history of China is obviously amazing and every site of cultural importance we saw was absolutely mindblowing, with no exceptions, outside Shanghai. China is constantly poetic in it's signage, i.e. "don't touch" becomes "a single act of carelessness leads to the eternal loss of beauty" or "no fires" becomes "when viewing the scenic spot, the fireproofing must be in your heart". The natural side of China actually lives up to the ancient paintings and classical images. And perhaps most astoundingly it is still possible to find peace and solitude in China. It rarely felt overly crowded (Note RARELY, not NEVER). In short, China was fantastic and the only reason I am not deeply depressed about leaving is that I am so sure I will return.
Patrick

china, china, china...where do i even begin to sum up a country as big, as historical (both ancient and recent), as influential, and as foreign as china, especially considering i was only there 2 1/2 weeks. i suppose i'll begin with the obvious: there are a lot of people in china. the most, really. 1.3 billion. but even with all the people, and in most instances because of them, china is incredible. from the minute we set foot in the country, the people were great. always helpful, very polite, and just a tad curious as to why we were actually there. i'll never forget the celebrity treatment we got in the guangzhou train station waiting room, the only two white guys in a sea of a thousand chinese people. and contrary to what everyone we had previously met had said, no one spat on us, no one was angry that we were there, no one scammed us (at least not too bad). in fact, because of the people we met, who graciously gave up their entire days to show us around, and this happened more than once, i have eaten two of the best meals i've ever had. meals i never would have even come close to eating had it not been for our people on the inside. the food in china is astoundingly good, and i can honestly say, that i don't think i've ever had as big an appetite in my life as the one i was experiencing in china (not to mention, my definition for 'edible' has been greatly expanded now that i've been to china).

and let's not forget about the history. i mean, i climbed an absolute crap load of stone steps up a really awesome mountain, with cool, old chinese temples along the way, to get to an even cooler, older temple at the summit. temples that are straight out of the history books, straight out of the classic paintings, straight out of "crouching tiger, hidden dragon." i mean, these were the temples where tai chi was created! how awesome is that? and then a few days later, i'm staring at an army of entirely individual, terracotta warriors that date back 2,000 years! and a few days later, i'm on a really big, really famous wall. and i could go on and on and on with history like this, but i'm sure i'm boring you, so i'll save it for later. so as i hope you can tell, i really loved china. the people, the food, the history, the landscape, the variety of everything, etc. i loved it all, and i can't wait to go back. although i could do without the smog, they really have a lot of it over there. the most, really.

peace,
bryan

from the terracotta warriors to peking duck, and everything inbetween

2008-05-30T14:18:00.005+10:00

"happy friday....i said happy friday!" sorry for the long delay in news everyone, but time just seems to be going faster and faster over here, so a bit of an update is in order...

we last left off as we stumbled out of the train station in xi'an, absolutely exhausted. but since we only had one night there, we had to move fast. so we checked into our hostel, did some much needed laundry, got some even more needed coffee, and quickly hopped on a bus headed for the major tourist sight in xi'an, the terracotta warriors. and they are absolutely incredible. an entire army of lifesize terracotta figures poised for battle, all slightly different, guarding the body of perhaps the most egotistical, paranoid emperor in chinese history. definitely a sight to behold. after we made our way back to town, we spent the evening wandering around the city, eating in its muslim quarter, and keeping it pretty low key. the next day was again quite relaxed, as many of the city's sights were closed due to the earthquake, so we grabbed some coffee, and caught the night train to beijing.

and this is where things got hectic...the minute we got onto the train, we began chatting with a young chinese kid named han, who was on his way home from spending the past year living in xi'an, and was going home to get ready for graduate school at mississppi state university this fall. so the next morning, we pulled into the beijing train station, with han saying, "i think i will come with you. so maybe you discuss this and let me know. i hope there is good result." happy to have him along, the three of us grabbed our bags and made our way to the hostel. we first went out for breakfast, where having a man on the inside makes all the difference, then hit up tiananmen square, the forbidden city, a great city park, coffee, and to top it all off, a meal of peking duck at the oldest, most famous restaurant in beijing. again, having someone with us that could speak chinese was essential, and because of that, this meal will undoubtedly go down as one of the best meals i've ever had. after dinner, we parted ways with han, grabbed a few cheap drinks at the hostel and called it a night.

the next morning, we made the mistake of sleeping in. when we got up, we realized how much we actually had to do, so we frantically tried to organize the next few days in china, book a train ticket to shanghai, attempt to book our departure from shanghai, etc. when the dust had settled, we took a stroll over to the beautiful temple of heaven and relaxed. getting quite hungry by now, we made our way over to beijing's famous night market for some eats and a bizzare foods marathon, where we managed to tackle a seahorse, scorpions, silkworms, kidneys, and sheep testicles. by this point, we thought we had had quite a night, but it was far from over. at the market, we met two locals, helen and andy, who upon hearing that we were recent college graduates and doing a bit of traveling around, wanted to take us out for drinks. cool, sounds good to us. when we walked into the bar, and saw that the cheapest beer was 35 yuan for a small bottle (big bottles at the hostel cost 6 yuan!), we knew we were in for a rough night. then when andy suggested a bottle of wine for 880 yuan, which is about 80 u.s. bucks, i nearly burst out laughing, and after explaining that we were traveling and couldn't afford the wine, we stuck to the expensive beer. yet when the bill came, and patrick and i threw in our 70 yuan, no one moved. as it turned out, we were apparently taking them out for drinks, and not looking to start a fight, we reluctantly paid for everyone. however, the night was not over.

over the drinks, we had been talking about food, and helen had decided that we should have a taste of beijing's famous spicy fish. thinking this was a chance for the bills to be evened out, we obliged. and yet again, i cannot stress how important it is having some inside people show you around town. this fish was probably the best fish i have ever had, hands down. certainly the spiciest. and the meal just never ended. everytime we thought we were making progress, something else would come out from the kitchen. at one point, we were eating tripe (cow's stomach), and helen kept filling my bowl with it. now, i'm not tripe fan number one, so i was just nibbling on it, but she kept filling and filling. "try, try. you no like?" "no, i like it, i'm just very full." "hmm. okay, i like." and that's how the meal went. it was awesome. until the bill came. once again, we took out our wallets and put down our share of the bill. we got blank, questioning stares back. stares that said "i don't understand. you still need to put in more." and so we did. certainly aggravated, our wallets completely empty, but our stomach's full to the point of nearly exploding, we grabbed a cab and went home.

for our last day, we woke early, and took a trip out to see the great wall. and what a great wall it is. it looks incredible, exactly as you picture it, gracefully snaking across the hills, little towers every 50 yards or so. and for the next couple hours, we climbed and climbed and climbed. i swear, between wudangshan and the wall, i've climbed more steps in the past week than i have in my entire life. but even if i could barely walk the next day, its worth it. once down, we went back to beijing (the wall is out of town), packed our bags, and hopped on the night train to shanghai. we were only there for two nights, but beijing really packed a punch.

peace,
bryan

Dr. Strangedays _or_ how I learnt to stop worrying and embrace fatigue

2008-05-22T01:44:00.005+10:00

Boy. It's been a weird couple of days. We left Hong Kong and got to the sprawling, obese, overflowing, dry heaving, gargantuan main train station in Guangzhou with time to spare. We fought our way into the station and eventually found the waiting room. I say room, but I mean barn. There were no less than 2000 people in there. Everyone was Chinese and we stopped them dead in their tracks. They had no idea what to make of us as we waded through them to find a spot in the sea of 5'6 black hair, brown eyes to drop our bags. There were a tense couple of moments, but after a few "Ni Hao"s and a couple of picture poses, we were family. We made our way to the train and quickly befriended the effervescent "Kevin", an English teacher from Chongqing. He told us (astoundingly) that there was a good chance that we were the first westerners that many of those people had ever seen. They were watching us like we were a nature documentary on TV. It was like the CEO of a company walked in late to a meeting, completely nude, and they were the other board members.

The train ride passed quickly due to the wonderful sleeper berths and soon enough, we were 1000 miles away and completely alone in the dark at 8 oclock at night on the platform at Wudangshan town, Hubei Province which is just about 60 miles southeast of nowhere. We found a disgusting room and settled down for the night. The next day we were up early, paying a guy to take us to the foot of the mountain, where we were supposed to catch something that was gong somewhere. The lack of information in English was frustrating and the language barrier was absolutely indomitable. To make matters worse, we were running very low on funds and Wudang mountain isn't exactly brimming over with ATMs, (although it is easily possible to spend plenty of money). We hit rock bottom and suggested bagging the whole thing and moving on to Xi'an early, but something inside us woke up and we decided to throw caution to the wind and head up the mountain dangerously low on funds. With about 25 bucks that was supposed to pay for accommodation, food, water and transport we were taking considerable risk. We found a hotel that charged us a reasonable rate for an unreasonable room and dropped our stuff. It only took 5 steps along the trail to realise that it was completely worth every second of heart-ache. The scenery was like nothing I have ever seen before. Take the most beautiful lush mountains you can imagine and dot them with ancient Taoist temples. Then connect the Temples with ancient stone steps that climb up forever until finally reaching the "golden roof" temple on the top of the mountain. I was seriously expecting to be allowed just one question to a monk who knows the meaning of life. ("Really? just one?....."Yes..... now you may go, my son") I took about 150 photos and not one of them came close to capturing the peace and beauty of the place. We walked down the mountain and ate a hearty meal of....rice. (Low on funds)

The next day we made it off the mountain, thanks to a decrepit bus full of kindly elderly Chinese tourists that let us ride into town for free with them. After this everything happened jarringly quickly. We were somehow ushered into a taxi with a man and some random girl who were going to another town, from which we could supposedly catch a train to Xi'an (our final destination). The girl happened to be going to the same place so we struggled through Mandarin for the duration of the car ride and arrived in the city of Shiyan (different place than Xi'an, but pronounced exactly the same way; this led to a lot of confusion). We ended up getting a delicious lunch and she called her friend who lived nearby. After trying and failing dismally to get a phrasebook, they called a "friend" who spoke good English. We went over to this friend's house and rode up to the 7th floor of a luxurious apartment complex. We walked in the door of the apartment to find an office and a 50 year old man, who had set out tea for us and introduced himself by saying "please excuse me, I have been drinking beer". It was coming up on 1 in the afternoon. Before we had even sat down, the girls that we were with had tea poured for the three of us (Bryan, me and "Gary" real name in Mandarin translates to "Blue bridge") The tea was strangely bitter and the girls were not drinking. They quickly made their exit. Blue bridge was being alarmingly polite and when he gave us a guest book to sign we wrote false info. It turned out Blue Bride worked for the commodities giant "Amway" and also for the China Construction Bank. He dabbles in Real estate, but apparently had all the time in the world to drink strange tasting tea with two dirty juveniles he had no reason to take any interest in. We talked for a while about increasingly heavy topics and we had to be careful with our words. He was wasted and seemingly temperamental. Things reached a fever pitch when he asked, staring me dead in the eyes "what do you think of China's Communist party's response to the disaster?" (earthquake). I tried not to shy away from his demanding gaze and carefully half-answered the question, evading anything that could possibly be taken offensively like the plague. He seemed satisfied and the girls eventually returned. He gave us a tour of his "facility" and finished out the afternoon tea with "The girls are happy to do anything that will make you.... glad.... to be in Shiyan, Have a wonderful time in China".

Upon leaving the building, Bryan and I promptly suggested splitting up with the girls, deciding to meet back up to retrieve our bags (Which were aggravatingly under the same ticket) from the baggage check at the train station at 8:30. After the cold war era interrogation with Blue Bridge we needed coffee. We met back up with the girls and got the bags. The one advantage to the whole thing is that going to a restaurant with a Chinese person means that they can order all of the things in Chinese that they would never sell to a Westerner. We feasted on Dumplings and made our way to the train. Bryan and I were dead tired and looking forward to the comfortable sleeper berths. The train pulled up and we got on in our carriage, only to discover that there were no sleeper births. Only hard upright non-reclinable seats. It was the worst 14 hours of my life. Crammed into uncomfortable seats in a smoky, hot car with 100 other people, all of whom seemed to be glued to us like kids to a cartoon. The worst part about the whole thing is that the distance between the two stops is only about 300 km. We had to keep stopping for freight trains. We arrived the next morning 4 hours late, way past exhaustion and absolutely starving.
Patrick

britain presents: hong kong

2008-05-17T15:07:00.004+10:00

just like australia a few hundred years ago, and america before that, the brits have yet again managed to dip their hands into far away lands. and there is absolutely no way of ignoring it.

yes, hong kong is a strange place. an absolutely gigantic, sprawling, urban jungle, where east really does meet west at nearly every turn, where green mountains and blue oceans fight with the enourmous skyscrapers for space, where the incredibly visible smog makes it hard to breath at times, and where money seems to be the end all and be all of the city and its people.

from the minute we got into hong kong, we have been in some sort of shellshock/sensory overload kind of state, literally walking around with our jaws on the sidewalk. there is so much to look at. no, no, no, let me rephrase that. there is entirely too much to look at. all the time. so after a few hours of just wandering, and wondering how the in the hell a place like hong kong actually exists, we decided to do the most touristy thing possible and take the tram up to victoria peak, for the sunset and subsequent night views of the city. when we made it to the top, excited to see one of the best skylines in the world, from one of the best viewpoints possible, we couldn't believe our eyes. we couldn't have been more than a few kilometers away from the city, and we could barely see it! the smog was that thick! but as night fell, and the view got a little cleaner, we relaxed, took it in, and mused on our present location on the globe.

that night, for my 23rd birthday, we grabbed some eats, a few drinks in the uber-fashionable patrick do you feel as much like a shmuck as i do right now soho neighborhood, and then called it a night because we felt too much like shmucks.

the next day, we ate yum cha (its a really awesome pseudo-buffet style dim sum thing) for lunch, rode around the island on a double decker bus, visited a few parks, wandered through a much cooler part of town, free of ex-pats, where we didn't feel like shmucks, grabbed some coffee and headed home. however, as what was initially intended as a quick drink in a local german pub turned into a belated birthday celebration with the 6 or 7 local hongkongers that regularly hung out there, our night ended up as a late one, with both of us thoroughly intoxicated.

and now we're leaving the big hk, both exhausted and energized, confused and in shock/awe, to hop on a 23 hour train ride bound for wudang shan, where we hope to find the 'old china' that we all imagine still exists. if there is an internet cafe there, and i end up writing a little update, i guess we'll have to keep searching.

Big Red

2008-05-16T23:25:00.007+10:00

We were not happy about waking up at 6 to get on the all-day bus into China, not sure about how far we could get, and with our hearts still floating around Ha Long Bay, but as soon the bus got out of Hanoi, the scenery got interesting. Mountains (real mountains, none of this Jive Thai bull shit) started literally rising vertically out of nowhere. The landscape started to look like a painting. We were on the smallest, most packed bus in the world and no one was speaking English. All of a sudden we were the only "Westerners" in sight. We had heard that they were not letting anyone into China for some reason. Things were looking bleak. Were it not for a kindly Singapore couple fluent in Chinese, English and Vietnamese, we would probably still be trying to get out through the Vietnam side of the border. It was a madhouse. Hundreds of people literally throwing their passports into the office in a big pile and smashing up against the window, with NO regard for anyone else. We saw a few people throw a few thousand dong in theirs to skip to the front of the line. Once we got through that chaos, we were set to leave Vietnam, and walked across the border into the no man's land. Then we walked into a big building and everything changed instantly. There were adequate facilities, manned by friendly staff. When we got through, we were ushered on to a big bus that was built recently and drove on actual highways (adhering to traffic laws) to our destination at a reasonable speed. We got to Nanning, and due to helpful staff made a tight connection to get to our destination THAT DAY!. Coming from Vietnam, where 300 km can take a few days, this was unheard of. We got into Guilin at night and promptly got lost. Luckily some guy came up to us and got his sister in Guangzhou on the phone who spoke English and at least tried really hard to help us to get where we were going. His efforts were unsuccessful, but his effort was most certainly appreciated. We ate a phenomenal meal for 4$ and went to sleep. The next day we walked through Guilin, heralded for centuries for it's beauty and poetic history. It does live up to it's reputation. The landscape is breathtaking. The only problem is the city of Guilin which, as it turns out, is enormous. The whole place had kind of a "Universal Studios presents: China!" vibe to it. The annoying part is that it is still so amazing, that even though they have dotted the 7 star scenic area with life-sized Pokemon characters, it is still dumbfoundingly beautiful. On the third day we took an all morning cruise down the Li Jiang (a river) to the town of Yangshuo. Resisting the immense urge to do nothing we rented bikes and rode off into the countryside. The area around Yangshuo is the china of ancient art, green, bamboo-clad limestone peaks rising vertically out of rivers. It was absolutely as beautiful as it could possibly have been. We capped it off with sunset on top of moon hill, hardly a "hill", more of a peak. This mountain has a cave in it that has eroded the whole way through, leaving it looking like it was shot with a cartoon cannonball. I have never seen or heard of anything like it, and to see it in person was surreal. We got back to town and ate about 100 of the best dumplings that we were ever likely to eat and crashed at 9:30. The next day was spent quietly, nursing sore muscles from the day before and preparing to leave for the polar opposite of where we were. At 8:45 we got on the overnight bus to Hong Kong.
Patrick

Vietnam, you shouldn't have....

2008-05-16T23:12:00.004+10:00

But you did. We went into Vietnam ready for war. We were under the impression that we would be robbed and hated for being American, and although our first 14 hours in the country were stressful, to say the least, as soon as we got to "Avalon", things picked up fast. There is an energy in Vietnam that is not the crazy boiling energy of Bangkok and not the fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants, slightly scary and often "loose canon" energy of Cambodia. It has a unique flow. It is also incredibly beautiful. Ha Long Bay is (as far as I can tell) the most beautiful place in the world. The food was great (the serving of all food with a big basket of fresh Herbs and Chillies is a practice that the rest of the world really needs to get the hang of), and the people were wonderful. They definitely have the best sense of humor in south-east Asia. One good example: the bus that we were going to get on was running late, but nobody told any of the passengers that we would be leaving at 10:30 instead of 8, so when Bryan and I showed up, tickets out, at 7:30 ready for the bus the guy said "no, the bus leaves at 10:30......maybe you should get......SOME COFFEE!!!!" And then promptly burst out into hysterical laughter, which was contagious. Vietnam was the first place that I was not ready to leave when the time came. The places that we went and the people that we met left such an impression, that they will be hard to top. It was with heavy heart that we headed north.
Patrick

what more can i say about vietnam? as patrick already said, i was prepared for the worst when the time came to leave cambodia. everyone we had run into had said that they hated it; that it was dirty, that the people were extremely unfriendly, that it was impossible to get around, etc. i was ready to hate the place. i was even on the lookout for things to dislike, to find what it was eveybody had been talking about so much. but i never found any of it! from the minute we walked across the border, i fell in love with the country. it is breathtakingly beautiful, charming in the way no place yet had been, modern when it needed to be, lawless when the adventure called for it. ho chi minh was the best introduction we could have asked for, and after five days, i feel like we barely scratched the surface. from there, it was off to the beaches of nha trang, the charms of old hoi an, the ancient capital of hue, and finally to hanoi and ha long bay. and even though we were sold a bad bus ticket, and i lost my gym shoes somewhere in there, i still love the place. with so much history, both ancient and more recent, with so many different places to go, with so much good food, and with everyone acting so friendly towards us, it was hard to leave. and when it came time to, and it dawned on me that we had been there for over two weeks, i was shocked. (i still don't believe it, but thats's what the calender says). and now that we have left southeast asia for the giant to the north, vietnam feels worlds away. china is an incredible place, but right now, my heart is still in vietnam.

peace,
bryan

hanoi rocks, ha long bay rocks harder

2008-05-12T22:07:00.004+10:00

my, my, my, how the time flies. sorry, we haven't updated this thing for awhile, but the past week has been positively hectic. there are a lot of stories to tell, so you'll just have to bear with me...

after our days in the lovely ancient capital of hue, we bused it on up the coast to the more recent vietnamese capital, hanoi. on a fellow traveller's suggestion, we made it to a great hostel in the heart of hanoi's old french quarter, dropped our bags, and hit the town. it was a truly comfortable, rainy, overcast day...one that we had been craving after all the sun of the past two months...so we stopped for a cup o' joe. and then we walked, and then another stop for another cup. it was a great day. that night, a group of us from the hostel went to the local irish pub for a few drinks, then drank a few drinks, and ended up befriending the most viking-looking swede i've ever seen.

the following day, we awoke hungry for adventure, so the three of us (patrick, myself, and the viking swede) decided to take it up a notch on the bizarre foods front. our lunch that day: fresh snake. so fresh, we saw it alive two minutes before we all had to drink shots of its blood. and eight snake courses, and who-knows-how-many shots of blood and snake wine later, we were stuffed. it was certainly crazy. so crazy we spent the afternoon hanging out drinking fresh brewed vietnamese bia hoi, while the viking swede told us all about his obsession with mcdonald's, kfc, and coca cola, and his regret that stockholm lacked both a starbucks and a taco bell.

the next day we bid farewll to hanoi, and said hello to ha long bay, where the next few days were spent cruising around the bay, kayaking, rock climbing, swimming, and drinking. it was generally a very smooth experience, save for a few hilarious snags here and there. for instance, on the second day, after spending the morning and afternoon successfully climbing four different, and rather difficult, rock faces, the tour leaders decided it was time for us to attempt some free solo deep water climbing (or something like that). this is where you jump from the boat to a rock wall, free of any climbing ropes, shoes, or harnesses, climb as high as you can, let go, and simply plunge into the deep water below. after a quick demo that made it look easy enough, we decided to give it a go. so patrick, myself, and two others were shuttled over to the rock on a vietnamese 'basket boat,' a vessel that looks like its made of wicker, rocks around vielently at the slightest imbalance, and takes on water like it breathes the stuff to survive. i have no idea why they're built.

anyway, so there we are, the four of us on this rickety old boat, heading over to the rock wall to become rock climbing stars. patrick makes it onto the wall, gets a step, and quickly falls. the same thing happens with the next person. the third makes it onto the rock. now its my turn...i'm thinking, 'okay, i can do this, i can climb, it can't be that hard. just get me a little closer.' and as the boat inches just close enough, the vietnamese guy who's been rowing the boat this whole time, and speaks no english, jumps out of his seat and onto the rock for a climb of his own, leaving me floating in this water-logged basket wondering what the hell just happened. i thought i was the one getting ready to climb. but i had no time to think, as the boat was perilously close to the cliffs. so i jumped behind the helm and took matters into my own hands. i rowed like i've never rowed before, screaming at the top of my lungs, "how did this happen?!! i wanted to climb!! how did this happen?!!" by now, the abandoner had fallen into the water and climbed back onto the boat, and was prepared to give me my shot.

so i leapt from the boat, grabbed onto the wall, wondered where the hell to go next, quickly realized i was in fact not a rock climber, took a frantic step up, slipped, and fell three feet into the water below. i swam back to the main boat where everyone else had watched the situation unfold, got dressed, and decided that i'll save rock climbing for the rock climbers. that night, we all grabbed a few drinks and called it a night. the next day, we made the journey back to hanoi, packed, said our goodbyes to all our new friends (i ended going back to the irish pub with everybody for more drinks...patrick had some sense and went to bed early ( i paid for it the next morning)) , woke up at 6:30 am, and left vietnam for that huge neighbor to the north, china.

so here i am now, in the biggest internet cafe i've ever seen, cigarette smoke burning my eyes, struggling with this computer to post new pictures, failing at it, and now giving up (check back a little later for those pictures). so there it is my friends...the past week has been jam packed with all sorts of crazy activities, and now that we're in china, i think the craziness will only increase. ladies and gentleman...its been wonderful, its been great...see you all next time.

peace,
bryan

Nha-Hue-An

2008-05-04T19:01:00.005+10:00

After tearfully waving goodbye to Hill and Glen as the bus pulled away, we found ourselves on an overnight sleeper bus on the way to Hoi An, with a 12 hour layover in Nah Trang. After a standard sleepless cramped bus night we got off the bus in Nah Trang and headed straight for the beach, which was one of the most beautiful yet. We lounged the hours away under a big wooden umbrella, drinking 333 beer and trying not to buy things from insistent prepubescent and abusive beachfront touts. The plan was to get on another overnight bus and finish the rest of our journey to Hoi An. We met some nice people at the bus station, and were staring down the barrel of a long, but totally bearable bus ride. We walked up and gave the ticket guy the ticket and he burst out laughing. After a good laugh all around we cheerfully inquired as to the source of all of this merriment and the guy pointed to the date on the ticket. It was for yesterday.

After saying goodbye to our new friends and finding an overpriced hotel, we assessed the situation at a local French owned Mexican restaurant. One Tequila led to the next and soon enough it was just us and the owner talking into the night. Maybe something else happened, but it is hard to say....the end of the night is fuzzy...We awoke the next day with a few hours to kill. Like 15 hours. I went to cafe and downed 8 pots of Vietnamese tea, much to the delight of the owners. Bryan got sick of watching me drink and hearing me talk, so, at about pot 5 so he went to the beach. When my hands were jittering so badly from caffeine that I could no longer pour myself a cup of tea, I decided that it was time to seek out bryan.
It was Vietnamese Reunification day, celebrating the vanquishing of the bloodthirsty American foe and the joyful coming together of south and north. There were no Westerners anywhere so when I saw Bryan, he was sticking out like a pink piece of bacon floating in a sea of coffee. He was sitting with a group of Vietnamese guys about our age.......all of them wasted. The language gap was like the grand canyon and the only way to overcome it was to ignore it and repeatedly toast and hug. I sat down and had a beer forced on me. We occasionally enlisted the help of passing interpreters that had no idea what to make of the situation, but for the most part we just sat and hung out. Apparently, they were having a great time and chose to commemorate the occasion with a Durian, the stinkiest fruit in the world. It is the definition of an aquired taste. After forcing down a couple of pieces, we bid our kindly, wasted hosts a fond fairwell and stumbled over to the bus. The bus got into Hoi An early the next morning and we made the most of the day, walking around the typical vietnamese town until heat and fatigue drove us to sleep. Having lost a day because of the bus ticket we only had that day in Hoi An before being forced to move on to Hue. Hue was the ancient capital and there is a fantastic old area that we spent an exciting afternoon walking around. When we were done there we went for a walk at sunset. Due to map reading error, we found ourselves in a more residential typical vietnamese area. Suddenly all of the people trying to get us onto motos and cyclos were gone. Everyone wanted to say hello and try whatever English they had learnt on us. Whole schoolyards full of people of all ages came up to say hello. We stopped for a 20c glass of fresh squeezed sugar cane and lime juice and reflected. All of the trip before arriving in Vietnam, we were prepared for the absolute worst by everyone we met. The rest of the world would have us believe that the vietnamese drank the blood of babies and would kill their own mothers for a few thousand dong. This could not be further from the case. I cannot fathom where those people got their ideas from. The Vietnamese are lovely people and their country and food are beyond reproach. I guess those other people just suck or something. With yet another overnight bus ride on our plates for tonight, we look forward to Hanoi.
Patrick

ho chi minh for awhile

2008-04-30T19:50:00.003+10:00

a hot shower, a big comfortable bed, constant air conditioning, a really awesome modern city, an insider's perspective, and two of the best hosts we could have asked for...what's not to love?

we arrived at the doorstep of patrick's aunt and uncle's (hill and glen) place late thursday night, dirty, hungry, and exhausted from the day's journey--after all, it only took a cramped taxi, a walk across 'no man's land,' two motos, two buses, and two more taxis to get to ho chi minh city from kampot, cambodia--so that first night is a bit of a blur. we got a bite to eat, a quick tour of the area courtesy of hill, and then called it a day.

after stocking up on some much needed sleep, the next few days in ho chi minh were incredible. we ate at some awesome restaurants (including a full on seafood lunch buffet at the renaissance hotel, and an anthony bourdain recommended bistro), drank some great coffee, bought a bunch of new clothes, saw the sights, went to a few clubs, drank some good beer, swam in an awesome rooftop pool, relaxed in a great apartment, watched a couple movies, and just hung out with hill and glen as much as they could stand. i just hope they had as much fun as we had.

ho chi minh is a really cool city. its big, its modern, its international...it has big city things, and big city things to do, and it made the difference having two people show us around and tell us where to go and what to skip. it is such an easy city to hang out in and spend time in, which is why we ended up spending a very relaxed 5 nights there.

and a good thing we did too. on our last night, because of a broken computer and a down network, we found ourselves at an internet cafe in the middle of town around 6 o'clock. when we finished up, we noticed a mass of people and police gathering in the streets, so we decided to check it out. an hour later, the olympic torch is being run down the street, there are chinese people everywhere, and the entire city seems to be screaming at the top of its lungs. we had accidently stumbled upon the olympic torch relay. it was pretty sweet. needless to say, ho chi minh really put on a show for us while we were there, and i can't wait to go back. and hill and glen, thank you for letting us crash at your place, it was awesome!

peace,
bryan

Cambodia in Retrospect

2008-04-28T02:58:00.002+10:00

Cambodia is constantly surprising. Be it in the way that a deadpan, unashamed total stare becomes a beaming, radiant smile when you say hello or the upfront way that the people talk about the recent horrors that befell their country. It wasn't what we expected, but in the best way possible. Cambodia has undeniably the cutest and friendliest kids in the world. They are all keen to say hello and run to the fences of schools to do so when you walk by. They are also big wavers. There is nothing as adorable as a 3 year old Cambodian kid waving at you from the back of a motorcycle. The people are the nicest I have ever met and if you give a little bit, they give back tenfold. Of course Angkor is amazing and the corruption is practically flaunted, but the true marvelous and mystifying things about Cambodia are the people. They have been put through hell in recent memory, but still offer to buy you Khmer "wine" when you have more in your wallet at that moment then they could hope to make in 2 months. The food was great and the sights were amazing and shocking but the thing that will be the hardest to forget are the Khmers themelves. They don't need to beep their horns as much as they do though.
Patrick

almost the minute i stepped out of the airport into the cambodian sun, the country hit me in a way that no place i've seen yet ever has. though i didn't really know what to expect from cambodia, the country exceeded all my unknown expectations. to me, it was such a heartbreaking place. everywhere i turned, i saw very real reminders of the catastrophe that was the khmer rouge, and the very real results of that regime. i saw it in the poverty of the countryside, in the destroyed and ransacked temples, in the infrastructure that the government has had to rebuild from scratch, and in the faces of the khmer people that lived through it. and still everywhere i turned, there were smiles on people's faces. everyone seemed happy, and everyone said hello.

and yet i also sensed a certain bit of stoicism just under the surface. i felt that the khmer people just want to distance themselves from their troubled past; but not by forgetting about it, or pretending that it never happened, but by stoically accepting it. and all they seem to ask for, is that the rest of the world take them seriously as a country and as a people, and understand that cambodia is more than just the khmer rouge. remember that it was a great empire long ago, and even though it has hit a rough patch recently, cambodia can be great again. and no where are these sentiments felt more than in the people. they are the reason why cambodia can be great again. and i feel that if the country and the people can put their mind to it, and get just enough help from the rest of the world, then it will happen. all they want is the chance.

bryan

The wild wild southeast

2008-04-28T02:40:00.006+10:00

Kampot has an undeniable wild west feel to it. Maybe it is the red dust that coats the streets or maybe the packs of ravenous stray dogs. Could even be the total lack of street lights. Who knows?...... Probably the murderous, voracious and aggressive packs of stray dogs. People tend to come to kampot because it is a jumping off point to other closeby attractions. We were there to see an abandoned French hill station and resort, which these days is basically a ghost-town. So, on our first day we went to see the abandoned French hill station and resort, which these days is basically a ghost town. On what is without a doubt the best value for money tour yet, we took a winding, amazing road through serious jungle and eventually arrived at the twice abandoned settlement, dramatically set on the edge of a precipice that drops a couple hundred feet into the wild jungle below. We were allowed to explore the rotting Casino and hotel at our leisure, and with no restrictions, so we basically just tramped around the buildings for an hour or two. After lunch we went to see some waterfalls, went on an hour long trek through the jungle which rocked, got absolutely pelted with a serious tropical downpour in the back of a pickup truck that offered no shelter from the painful, enormous and freezing raindrops, and finished up with a relaxing, but slightly boring hour long river cruise. Things shut down early in Kampot and so after a narrow miss with a pack of local dogs we adopted a "when in rome" mentality and called it quits at about 9:30. The next day we awoke and met two great people from the trek, (Sara and Rishi from WA) who were to accompany us on our voyage to Saigon the next day. We were up at 7. After catching a share taxi to the border, (And having to bank on the border guard's bad command of english when he asked for proof of yellow fever vaccination and I showed him a walgreen's prescription information sheet) it was a simple 2 motorbikes, 1 eight-hour bus ride, another 4 hour busride (no aircon on either), and two taxis till we arrived oh-so-tired at Hill and Glen's oh-so-comfortable Saigon Apartment at 10 oclock in the evening.

and what a wat it was

2008-04-22T21:20:00.003+10:00

...and we're back. sorry for the delay everyone, but the computers over in this part of the world are a bit on the slow side, to say the least. so here's what we've been up to...

after saying goodbye to the phnom, we hopped on a bus and barreled our way up the road to siem reap and the temples of angkor. i seriously think our driver figured there was a bomb strapped under the bus, and that we would all blow up if we dropped below 50 miles an hour. i mean, this guy was really moving. cow in the road, no problem. slow moving truck ahead, no problem. we just barreled on past them. but we finally made it to siem reap, alive, and so exhausted that we just ate dinner at the hostel and relaxed. i should say here that our dinner was a khmer barbecue, cooked tableside, by an employee named mao, who was so cool we ended up just hanging with him all night.

the next days were some of the hottest, sweatiest, most temple-filled days of my life. we just woke up at 9, tuk-tukked our way over there, and explored some of the oldest structures i've ever seen 'til we couldn't handle the heat anymore. and they are pretty incredible. we'll put up some pictures soon, because words can't really convey how awesome they are; they are simply really old, really big, really historic jumbles of crumbling stone. see, aren't i painting a good picture for you?

there is one downside to the whole angkor wat experience however: the overwhelming amount of young girls trying to sell you absolute crap. it went something like this...
as we're getting out of our tuk tuk,
"do you want cold drink?" one asks,
"do you want guide book?" another asks,
"do you want bracelet for girlfriend?"
"what's your name?"
alright bryan, this time, do not tell them your name, just make one up, its easy...
"bryan," i say. stupid.
"where are you from?"
"do you want scarf? one two dollar."
okay. this time i'll say i'm from canada. that'll throw 'em off. and no i don't want a scarf! its like a hundred degrees out here! i'm already sweating from the cool breeze!
"america. i'm from the u.s. and how much for the scarf?" dammit, fooled again.
"do you want t-shirt," another girl yells
by this point they're coming at me from all sides. i call to patrick for help, but he's fending off a swarm himself. its not looking good now. they're attacking from the front, the back, oh, one's got my arm now!
"do you want two t-shirt, maybe one for you, one for girlfriend, same same but different."
"no thank you, i already have a t-shirt."
"but why!"
oh god, i'm not even gonna get a chance to see angkor wat! i'll be smothered to death by a throng of pre-pubescent future used-car salewomen before i even make it in! one's got my leg, one's got my other arm, i'm going down!! i felt like bill paxton from the scene in aliens where he's fending them off as best he can, 'til one finally comes up from the floor and does him in. needless to say, four dollars later, i was the proud owner of 2 lukewarm bottles of water, a single, rather ugly postcard, and a solid collection of truly crappy wicker bracelets for my girlfriend. at least that's who the little girl recommended them for (i am now taking relationship advice from a 12 year old).

anyway, for our last hoorah in siem reap, we met up with a couple friends we met the previous night, had a few drinks, and somehow ended up at the most popular place in town, a place where all the young khmer kids go, a club called zone 1...and it was hilarious. strobe lights, lasers shooting everywhere, some truly hysterical cambodian house music, it was the whole package. but as the night was getting later, and our 6:00 am wake-up call getting closer, we left the club, said goodbye to our friends, and headed back to the hostel for some sleep.

and for the past few days we have been hanging out on the cambodian coast, first in a town called sihanoukville, and now kampot, taking in the sights and getting geared up for vietnam...but more on that later. hope everyone is doing well and having a good time back home (or wherever you are)!

peace,
bryan

We like Phnom Penh.

2008-04-17T21:41:00.003+10:00

Fatigued and demoralized after a three way English-Israeli-hooker fight (more complicated than it's worth explaining) happening on the street outside the internet cafe at 4 in the morning in Bankok, Bryan and I bid our beloved compadres, Tess and Greg, a fond fairwell and got into a cab of our own. We got to the airport with a ton of time to kill but an all too leisurely trip to the bathroom on my part translated into us running to catch the plane and being the absolute last people on. I also forgot to take a bottle of Thai Whiskey out of my Carry-on before we got to the security check.....which....delayed us further. ANYWAY, After a short flight we arrived in Phnom Penh completely exhausted. After completing the entry tasks we got a cab to a hostel recommened to us by a good friend. The cab driver was incredible with english and extremely nice, both of which hit us like a cold bucket of water to the face after Thailand. We got to the hostel which was nice and found out we only had to pay $5 each for a room with AC, cable and a HOT SHOWER. The first hot shower since leaving Australia almost a month ago. We slept until the late afternoon and got up. The first thing that happened was that I heard my name and assumed it wasn't directed at me so I kept on walking. Then I heard "how did you sleep" and I turned to see a cambodian guy that I mentioned my name to while I was half asleep, totally in passing. As we went around the city we began to notice: People in Cambodia are really really nice. Seemingly everyone. We were ready for war upon getting off the plane, expecting a ghetto country-wide version of the worst parts of Bangkok but the reality could not be further from that prediction. What followed were a couple of wonderful days with a few very memorable highlights. The first night we ate a bag full of beetles that we shared with some really cute kids on the street. The next day we did the essential but heartbreaking and horrifying tour of the notable genocide-related sights in and around Phnom Penh. An estimated 2 million people died during the Khmer Rouge rule and today is the 33rd anniversary of the fall of Phnom Penh. Perhaps the hardest things to look at out of the whole day were the pictures of the kids dancing in the streets as the Khmer Rouge walked through Phnom Penh. They were initially treated as liberators and were given a tickertape-esque welcome. over the next couple of hours things really went off the deep end fast. After seeing those sights we were in a bit of a depressed mood and went back to the hostel where our spirits were brightened by the lovely staff and ridiculious, impossible to follow, Chinese MTV. The next day we took in happier sights. Bryan got his hair cut in a slum and we went to the royal palace, followed by dumplings. At night we ate tarantualas. And after a hilarious longer-than-it-should-have-been bus ride, we sit in Siem Reap with Angkor Wat on our plates tommorow.
Patrick

thailand: our final thoughts

2008-04-15T21:34:00.009+10:00

so after a quick boat ride to the next bay over, a taxi to the pier, another 4 hr. boat ride across open ocean, a 7 hr. bus ride up the coast, an all nighter with tess, greg, and a passed out tuk-tuk driver in bangkok, another taxi to the airport, a plane to a new country, and a taxi to our hostel, all with the thai new year water festival going on, we have finally made it to phnom penh...whew, i need a second to catch my breath.

but before we delve into the unknown once again, let's take a minute and look back...

thailand...at first it hit me like a ton of bricks. the mass amounts of people, the traffic, the tuk-tuks, the food, the smells, the heat, the constantness of everything. those first few days, i didn't know where to go, what to do, or who to trust. but after a little while, the country seems to get into you. i got used to all the new sights and smells, and the new way things were done in this part of the world. by the time i left bangkok, i felt like i could handle the city, even if i was still ready to leave it. chiang mai was a relief from the hustle and bustle of the previous few days, and it was so easy to relax in that city. it was so much smaller, so much cleaner, and everyone was so friendly. it was not however, any cooler up there, as almost everyone told me it was essentially the arctic circle up there, as far as they were concerned...

and by the time we made it to koh phangan and koh tao in the south, i felt as if i had been in thailand for months, and australia felt like eons ago. by this time, i knew exactly what to expect, and what was normal or not. i knew what food was good, what deals were good, and how to get along with the locals. by now, everyone was friendly, so it was no surprise that the guys who ran our hostel on bottle beach were the nicest staff i've ever seen. they made chilling out very easy.

all in all, thailand is a very interesting place. it seems to be a country of juxtapositions, with ancient temples next to big office buildings, buddhist monks checking out the street markets, mercedes benz' driving down some of the poorest streets i've ever seen. but it is a great place. the people are friendly, the food is incredible, the sights are mind-blowing, and i even felt like i could easily handle bangkok when we were back there for a few hours. i have no idea what cambodia holds, but i'm sure it will be incredible.

peace,
bryan

Now. What would a final thought on a place be if I sat by and let this opportunity drift on by?
I feel I must also make myself heard here.

Thailand is a mess of contradictions. Getting to Bangkok in the middle of the night and not knowing what is going on at all is enough to leave a sour taste in the mouth of even the most seasoned "ürbanite". We wondered "where is this smile of the Thai We have heard so much about?" We pretty much came to the conclusion that the only time that they smiled was when they were walking off with your money. BUt as things went on we started to notice all of the little quirky differences that make Thailand so unique. The first thing that hits anyone coming from the US is the sheer number of 7-11s. That's right. The convenience store. They are everywhere. Where we were staying in Bangkok there were 4 on the same 2 block stretch of street. They are always there when you need them. The hill trek was on average disappointing but the highlights were so good they made you forget the bad times and I look back on the whole thing uber-fondly. There is a certain hilarious bootleg-ness about much of thailand that once you get used to it is quite endearing. The Thai mantra "same same" pretty much sums it all up. It is a phrase used to illustrate the idea that two things are similar enough for you not to make a big deal if you get one, but were expecting (and most of the time, paying for) the other. 6oo baht change instead of 700...same same.......Pick you up at 9:00, but actually get picked up at 10:20.....same same. But once you get used to the whole thing, it is pretty much the same. At the start of our time in Thailand we were astounded, annoyed and distrustful of the amount that Thais tend to outsource chores. For example, you are waiting to be picked up at a certain time at a certain place from a certain guy. That guy shows up late and waits with you for about 5 min, not saying a whole lot. After 5 minutes another un-uniformed and previously unmentioned guy walks up and the first guy who you are expecting to be driven by says, "OK You go with my friend". At first we were like "Who the %$@0! is this guy and do you expect me to follow him to some place where he will steal our passports and sell them on the black market, leaving us for dead?!?" But by the end we were pretty much like "Oh nice...that other guy is here.....He'll take us!" It just took some getting used to. As we got further into thailand we realized that some of these people are among the nicest we are ever likely to meet and and some of the people we are least likely to forget. On top of all of this, the food absolutely rocks and the country is at times too beautiful for words. At the beginning it was our classic midwest trust that first got us screwed and then our homegrown American xenophobic closedmindedness kept us crazy-skeptical, but once the two balanced out, (and it took a couple of days) we were ready and able to really enjoy ourselves. I can't wait to go back.
Patrick

...paradise lost

2008-04-12T18:21:00.003+10:00

hello all...i know its been awhile since the last update, but sitting at a computer has proved very difficult in our current environment. i mean, the ocean is right there!

but since i've managed to get myself in front of one, i'll let you all know what we've been up to...

after our stay on koh phangan, we headed for the island directly to the north of us, koh tao, where we had heard that the scuba diving and snorkeling was not-to-be-missed. once settled (in what has been the nastiest room so far), we took a swim, ate some dinner, drank some beer, took in the sights, and headed to bed. the next day, we boated on over to koh nang yuan, the extremely picturesque group of islands connected by three beaches (see pictures below), swam some more, and hiked it on up to the top, where we managed to get those pictures off of some very precarious rocks. for our last day on koh tao, we went on an 8 hour snorkeling trip to various points around the island, where we saw some pretty incredible coral, some awesomely stereotypical tropical fish, and a someone get really seasick...so it was definitely a good time.

and now we are back on koh phangan, where we have gloriously managed to meet up with patrick's cousin and her boyfriend, tess and greg, who we hung out with a lot while we were in melbourne-and it has been great! some familiar faces at this point are a very nice sight to see indeed. the past few days have again consisted of coconut shakes, good books, good food, and lots of relaxing on the beach. but sadly, it is our last day here in paradise. tommorow, we make the trek up to bangkok for an early flight to phnom penh, where the next leg of the craziness begins. i hope everyone is doing well back home (or wherever home is for you) and stay safe.

peace,
bryan

paradise found...

2008-04-05T16:11:00.002+11:00

"...ladies and gentleman, this just in: paradise, a place thought to exist only in the minds of hollywood writers, postcard photographers, honeymooners, and dreamers, does in fact exist."

yes ladies and gents, the reports are true; paradise has been found.

so after our hilarious trek through the jungle, we have left chiang mai for the south islands of thailand. and after meeting up with a german couple who knew a lot more about where we were headed, and who graciously offered to take us with them to the beach they were staying at, we have found ourselves at bottle beach on the island of koh phangan. and believe me, the pictures do not do it justice. it is so nice here...the food, the people, the staff of the resort, the warmest ocean i've ever swam in, the white sand beach, the seclusion...everything here is so awesome. again, we pass the time by swimming, reading, drinking coffee, coconut shakes, and singha, playing cards, etc...boy, is it a hard life.

but tomorrow, we leave this gorgeous place for the island to the north, koh tao. hopefully, it will be as nice, and somehow, i think it will.

peace,
bryan

Hikey Hikey with Mr. Don

2008-04-05T15:31:00.003+11:00

After a very loose 9:00 am pickup (more like 10:30) we were off on our hill tribe trek. Bryan and I were expecting it to basically be us and a machete weilding guide hacking his way through the undergrowth to meet a tribe that had never seen westerners before. As soon as we saw how many people were cramming into the back of the converted pickup, we knew we were in for a hilarious ride. We drove for a while and were taken to a "market" to buy supplies. This market was little more than a glorified roadside bootleg ugly cousin of a 7-11 with the worst selection of any store in history. Basically everyone got out of the truck and stood around akwardly wondering if the guides were serious or not. After this we drove up into the hills for 40 min to a not particularly scenic picnic spot where we wee introduced to the rest of our party. All is all we had: Bryan and I, 2 Norwegian girls, 1 Japanese family of four, one japanese girl who basically became babysitter for the Japanese family of four, one hilarious queensland bogan, so stupid that I thought he was mentally retarded at first, one annoying american girl who "was working for national geographic and playstation buuuuuuuut is between contracts with them sooo I went on this trip buuuuuut my boss told me I could come back anytime!" (over and over and over) from Washington DC, two cool guys from Singapore, and the cherry on the sundae: a twenty-something named Mark from Manchester complete with silent Thai "companion". The only time she said anythign was while sitting next to me at dinner when her and Mark got into a quiet and hilarious fight because she was refusing to eat. We set off led by the enigmatic and soon-to-be-really-drunk guide simply named "Mr. Don" who kept repeating his mantra "come on, lets go hikey hikey with Mr Don!" We walked for the afternoon and eventually arrived at the hilltribe village were we were staying for the night (about 3 hours early). There were no Karen Longnecks (as they are called) in sight. We were told they would be arriving later. We basically just hung out in the village for the rest of the night, and it was unspectacular except for one heck of a BBQ at about 10:30. The long necks themsleves eventually did arrive and basically just sat in their huts trying to sell very uninteresting things. The whole scene was a bit depressing so we refrained from documenting it, as people were treating the longnecks more like "attractions" than people. After the worst nights sleep in recent memory we got up and hiked out, leaving 3 people who were going for 2 nights in stead of one. Boy we felt sorry for them......poor bastards.

The next day was packed with activities. We walked to an elephant camp and went for a ride on the elephant. (See video) Right after we stopped filming, our elephant freaked out and the abusive freak who was driving it started hacking into it with this hooked pole. It was also quite depressing. We were positive we were going to die as the elephant trumpeted loudly because it didn't want to go in the water. It's call sounded exactly like a FFF trombone. We got back and breathed a sigh of relief. After that we drove to a beautiful river and swam, then went white water rafting and bamboo rafting, both of which were awesome. All in all the trip was unbelievably annoying at times, but the good times were so good that it made the experience a positive one over all. Then it was back to Chiang Mai to fly out the next morning for Koh Samui.
Patrick

night train to chiang mai

2008-03-30T18:10:00.004+11:00

and there we were...on the oldest, shakiest, and longest train ride either of us had ever been on. but it was the only one available, so we bit our lips and saddled up. after all, how bad could it be?

well, apparently, it could be as bad as it could be. the first few hours were great, since we ended up drinking with (and buying the drinks for) an employee of the train who was very friendly, even if we only had 3 words in common with each other. alright, so far, so good. but then, it was time for bed. a really small bed. on a really shaky train. i think i managed to sleep for a collective hour and a half out of the whole 10 hours we were expected to sleep. i seriously thought the train would derail at the next gentle curve, it was that shaky. but after 15 hours, very little sleep, and a sore back, we had finally made it to chiang mai.

and how nice it is up here. its cleaner, smaller, friendlier, cheaper, and much more relaxed than the hustle and bustle of bangkok. so far, all we've really done is eat some really good food, visit the impressive night market, sleep in, and get a couple of hair cuts, where we found that a language barrier can be a bigger problem than one might expect. so we'll spend a few more days here, and then head to the warm ocean and sandy beaches of the south islands.

peace,
bryan

Bangkok: the city that explodes your head

2008-03-27T01:10:00.002+11:00

And so it was that on Tuesday morning, at 12:30 am, we got out of a taxi (where seatbelts were not an option, and traffic laws are more of a suggestion) and intrepidly marched down Bangkok's Khao San Road in search of a place to stay. After finding a likely spot, we sat down for a beer and took stock of the situation. It was hot. Really really hot, with 100% humidity. I must again stress the heat. It was hot.

Walking around is like wading through a bath, there is so much going on all of the time that when you first get there, you just get bowled over with the effect of sensory overload. We eventually turned in at about 2:30 and slept heavily.

The next morning we were walking down the street and a smiling yellow-shirt-wearing Thai comes up to us and starts talking to us. He says he is a school teacher, speaks great English, and writes our names in Thai. Nice guy, lots of class, great smile. And at the end of a lengthy, pleasent conversation, he flagged down a tuk tuk, negotiated a pretty good deal for a little tour of the city (about 80c each), and sent us on our way. However, since this first encounter, we have had no less than 10 people come up and ask us the same questions, all "teachers," all classy, with great smiles all around. Thus we have concluded, they are all obivously conmen of some sort, but what they have to gain is unclear. A commision from $1.60 amounts to pretty small potatoes. Definitley not enough to afford decent oral health. In fact we came to the conclusion that every single person in a position to screw us over at all, did so with a smile on their face. (Luckily, this royal repeated screwing has only amounted to 8 or 9 dollars, but it is the principle of the matter)

It is so easy to get swallowed up by the hustle, pollution, and unique smells of this place that it is easy to give up hope quickly. That said, we are having a great time and Bangkok is an amazing place. Street food is everywhere and (against my physician's best advice) we have been filling up on the street for practically every meal. We have seen some enormous buddhas all clad in gold and many of the classic things you would expect to see are here. Tommorow we leave Bangkok on the night train north to the jungle-clad mountains of Chiang Mai.

Patrick

australia, we hardly knew ye...

2008-03-23T23:30:00.006+11:00

oh australia, if only we had more time together; but alas, 'twas not meant to be.

i am sad to report, that our time in this wide brown land is coming to a close, but the final days here have certainly left an indelible impression in my mind. on thursday, we were lucky enough to get tickets to the afl (aussie rules football) season opener here in melbourne, which was pretty incredible. and i will say that australians really love their footy. there was a constant low roar throughout the entire stadium that never died down, with huge outbursts every time a goal was scored. sounds pretty normal, but its really sweet if you're a part of it.

on friday, a bunch of us headed to glen maggie (an awesome lake house that patrick's grandparents built from scratch in the early '60s), for the weekend, where we lounged around all day, drank many afternoon teas, took a few swims, and simply relaxed.

and now that the weekend has passed, i'm sitting here writing this, hoping that i'll be back to australia sooner than i think. it is an incredible place with so many sides to see, and 3 weeks is just not enough time. tomorrow we are off to thailand, and the hustle and bustle of bangkok. i have no idea what to expect, but i can't wait...

peace,
bryan

Everybody loves Raymond

2008-03-19T14:16:00.004+11:00

Monday the 17th of March began rather chaotically for Bryan and I. We got a bit of a late start and were forced to sprint flat out for a half mile, with packs, to run and catch the train to Raymond Island. If we had been 10 seconds later, our plans would have been drastically altered, but by some stroke of luck, we made the train. Half an hour after we got on the train we had regained our breath and were ready to take in the pretty Victorian countryside. We arrived in the small city of Bairnsdale to take the bus to the smaller city of Paynesville, where the bus driver took everyone else to their respective houses first, and what should have been a 20 minute journey turned into an hour and a half long hotter-than-hell deathride.

When we finally made it across to the island we discovered that due to a "miscommunication", my grandfather Donald was not at home, nor was going to be at home for the vast majority of the time we were going to be on the island. So Bryan, Fritz and I had an intimate couple of days. A couple of walks, 5 mochas, 1 milkshake, one hilarious island St Patrick's day bash, a few koalas, one dog walk en-mass, a few kangaroos, one broken boat, one island tour, one conspiracy lock theory, one conversation on a conspiracy theory involving the British royals, one lesson on boat building and one whopper 7 hour genealogy and Webster family lineage conversation, we sit here packing and ready to depart back to Melbourne on the 4:30 train. Raymond has been good to us. Subdued, relaxing, and dog filled, it rarely surprises, but never disappoints.
Patrick

melbourne. noun. pron: {mel-(b)in}

2008-03-17T00:56:00.003+11:00

melbourne, what a cool city. we've been here since thursday night, and it could so far be summed up as easy going. we're staying with family again, which is really awesome (one, cause its nice seeing everyone; two, cause it makes everything a lot nicer) and we've basically just passed the days hanging out with them and catching up with friends. there was one day that we spent exploring the city, which has a really nice energetic vibe to it, kind of halfway between the u.s. and europe.

tomorrow we're heading to raymond island, a koala reserve where patrick's grandparents live, and i have an early train to catch, so goodnight.

bryan

byron bay, the british invasion

2008-03-17T00:20:00.002+11:00

contrary to what the title of this post would have you believe, patrick and i have left the swedish infested byron bay for the more aussie filled town of melbourne. but byron bay was so much fun, its worth a look back...

after overdosing on blonde hair and blue eyes, we decided to hike it on up to the ol' lighthouse to see if we could escape the scandanavian pandemonium going on below. along the way, we bumped into two brits, ben and kim, who were so cool we ended up hanging out with them for the rest of our time in byron.

but i've digressed...the lighthouse was awesome. we actually got lucky enough to see wild dolphins down in the ocean, a huge 5' goana lizard, and a really awesome view. it was so good, we stayed up all night and made it back up there for the sunrise. as only our luck would have it, the sky was really really cloudy. so we got more of a sky getting slowly brighter, rather than a sun rising. nonetheless, it was still really cool.

and the next few days we just spent hanging with ben and kim, swimming in the ocean, and chilling at the beach. it was a short stay, but byron really packed a punch while we were there. and now onto m-town.

bryan

Byron Bay, Sweden

2008-03-11T12:40:00.000+11:00

Everywhere you turn in Byron Bay all you here is "nood" this or "Ausgang" that............thats right. ........

This place is absolutely overrun with Swedes.

At first it was interesting but now it is just downright frustrating. On a lighter note, Byron Bay is actually pretty sweet. Its a 3 mile long beach that has a lighthouse on the hill and is pretty much picture perfect. Needless to say the Swedes have thwarted Bryan's numerous valiant attempts for love. They come over in packs and destroy any good vibe he has going with their crazy-speak. The worst part is not a single one of them has heard of Meshuggah, rendering them utterly useless. We are here till Thursday and then we go down to Melbs for the rest of our time here. The days in Byron are pretty chill. Just hanging out on the beach and drinking coffee. The only thing that changes at night is that the coffee becomes beer. Despite the incompetant Swedes we are still managing to have a good time.
Peace,
Patrick Jorgensoon.

beaches and blue skies in sydney

2008-03-09T07:55:00.005+11:00

g'day mates! (cheesy i know, but what did you expect). welcome to 'uh...we're not from around here', the spankin' new blog patrick and i set up for this around the world trip. hopefully it will be somewhat interesting, a little informative, and always funny. we'll try and get some pictures up asap, so keep checking.

for the past few days, we've been hanging out in sydney, australia, which has been really awesome. so far, we've basically hung out at the beach, walked around a ton of the city, drank some coffee and beer, and then chilled at the beach some more. the weather here has been ridiculously nice the whole time. right now it's about 75 with completely blue skies (sorry)!

while we're in sydney, we've been staying with patrick's aunt and uncle, marianne and robert, who have been really really cool, so its been a great lead into the whole trip. on the 10th, we'll hop a plane to a place called byron bay, which is a cool beach place i guess, hang there for three days, then take a plane to melbourne, where we'll meet up with more family. and from there, off to bangkok! needless to say, its been awesome. well, gotta go...the ocean is calling. so check back soon for some pics and new updates, and we'll see you soon.

bryan